


Parenthetical

by bakedgoldfish



Category: The West Wing
Genre: Poetry
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2003-04-05
Updated: 2003-04-05
Packaged: 2019-05-15 04:53:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 388
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14783925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/bakedgoldfish/pseuds/bakedgoldfish
Summary: Leo Poetry





	Parenthetical

**Author's Note:**

> A copy of this work was once archived at National Library, a part of the [ West Wing Fanfiction Central](https://fanlore.org/wiki/West_Wing_Fanfiction_Central), a West Wing fanfiction archive. More information about the Open Doors approved archive move can be found in the [announcement post](http://archiveofourown.org/admin_posts/8325).

**Parenthetical (poetry, 1/1)**

**by:** Baked Goldfish

**Character(s):** Leo!  Always Leo.  It's The Leo Show.  
**Rating:** MATURE, for one bad word near the end  
**Disclaimer:** Not mine.  Please don't sue.  


(Inhale.) 

Outside, the wind batters the brick building, hot and harsh.  

(Peel the sweat-drenched sheets from your skin.)  

The night is old, and the sun will be rising in a short few hours; the folks on the floor above are already awake, and their bed is making your ceiling squeak rhythmic- -ally as you rub the remnants of sleep out of your eyes.  You wonder how, if this is supposed to be the premium, crème de la crème of apartments, just how a person could live in second best. 

(Sit up and land your feet on the ground,) and realize that second best is subjective.  

You are the best at what you do, but to most, you have been second your entire life.  (Move the piles of work on the ground;) from birth, when you were the second child, to now, where you work in the background for someone much more important than you.  And if it is lonely at the top, it is even lonelier right below.  

(Disrobe.) 

The bathroom is bland, all beiges and whites and tile and metal.  The grout is barely beginning to show wear, griming up at the joints and turning a sickly shade of gray.  There is a coolness to the bathroom that is not evident in the bedroom, a coolness that causes you to shiver.  It is quiet again, and it is four in the morning; outside, the wind continues to beat against the walls, as if to crumble them with heat and force.  (Turn the water on, 

and let the shower sting you.) 

Your neighbors above you are finished, and presumably asleep again when you re-emerge from the shower.  

(Wonder what your staff is doing right now,) 

(and if they were awoken by couples fucking above, beside, around them.  Wonder if they have ever been only second.)  

(Pull your clothes on.)  

The city is beginning to wake up now, and a few cars venture out onto the streets below, their tires connecting with the pavement with a sad, mournful sound.  Lay back down, and stare up at the ceiling, praying that your staff will never put themselves second. 

(Exhale.) 


End file.
